Some folks (it seems on Twitter, mostly) have accused the cops of corralling them onto the bridge, and then trapping them there, and arresting them.

We just got back from the permanent location of the protests (at Zuccotti Park), and got a clearer sense of what happened.

The truth seems a little less dramatic than the accusations, but still interesting.

One speaker addressing the crowd basically suggested it was a blunder by protesters, who originally planned to just go over the pedestrian part of the bridge, but upon seeing some people take the road (against the suggestion of protest organizers!), started going more and more on the actual road, not really realizing what was going on.

A protester named Meg, who wound up on the road, specifically explained: "What happened was... we just started going into the bridge; the cops were directing traffic. We just kept going. Moral was really high."

Then: "We just stopped. Everything just stopped."

People who were on the pedestrian bridge above, alerted the protesters in the road that cops were on the bridge, stopping protesters, and making periodic arrests: "kind of choosing people at random."

It was her sense that the cops were initially just arresting people who were particularly vocal or provocative in some way.

At some point, the cops boxed everyone in with red nets, so nobody could leave.

She said they started singing songs (including the national anthem) while they waited, assuming they would all be arrested.

It turns out, most of the people caught between the nets on the bridge (some did make it to Brooklyn, others turned back before the corralling started), did get arrested, though she said that she and a friend were allowed to leave, while their male friend was forced to stay behind.

In fact a totally separate protester said the same thing: Almost all fo the arrested were male.

That protester told a similar story: Kind of an accidental move to the roadway that the cops at first seemed to be cool with (since cars were also getting past the protesters) only to conclude with the nets coming out. He (his name was Josh) actually slipped out of the nets when a cop was looking the other way.

In the meantime, protesters believe the arrested are being held at 5 different jails (3 in Manhattan, 2 in Brooklyn) and they're sending people to each jail to wait for everyone to make bail.